Truck Driver's Experiences with COVID-19

The person involved has returned to Mexico, this person’s supervisor was the one who told me about this bad experience. These people come from Mexico with a temporary work visa, and they transport beets, these people are all professional truck drivers in Mexico, but they are offered better wages and the opportunity to obtain green cards. In this time of the Coronavirus, they have been working a lot of hours for less money, they are not provided hand sanitizer nor masks (which they are grateful that we were able to provide these things that are so important to protect our health). One of the truck drivers got sick from the Coronavirus, he was isolated in a hotel for 2 weeks. Two weeks in which he did not work and did not make any money and he was responsible for paying for his own COVID test. And he also had to pay for his 2 week stay in the hotel, at the end he returned to Mexico with no money and with a lot of health problems. With the sadness and disappointment of having not made any money to sustain his family. The job they offer him is only temporary and they, year after year, come to look for a better life, the supervisor of this person and the other workers and very disappointed with the treatment they receive when it comes to their health, no one tells them what they can do in case they are infected. No one gives them information nor resources to protect themselves, they only come to work hard. They do the work that no one else wants to do, of driving and transporting tons of beets every night, no matter the cold, or the snow, it doesn’t matter if they have a health problem. The majority of them do not speak English, they do not know that there are organizations or places where they can go to ask for help. When I told them about this organization, I told them that we also have a very good lawyer that could help them. They said no to working with the lawyer because they could lose their jobs, they said they could lose their job if they speak about all of the abuse that they are victims of. They said next time they would not receive the work visa and they would be labeled as bad workers so they would not be contracted with any other company in the U.S. Also, if they try to look after themselves they would have a bad record, in the eyes of the company.